In Radio World’s Aug. 3 issue, the Buyer’s Guide section focuses on audio transport, including codecs and STLs.
Barry Mandziak is responsible for six stations in his role as technical supervisor for Pattison Media’s operations on North Vancouver Island in British Columbia, Canada.
“During the pandemic our offices buildings and studios in Nanaimo, Courtenay and Port Alberni emptied out, and we had to ramp up our remote broadcast capabilities immediately to support announcers and producers working from home in remote studios,” said Mandziak.
“We had only four Tieline Bridge-IT units and were running six shows,” he continued. “We purchased a Tieline Gateway eight-channel IP codec that would be wired into our Nanaimo studio location. This would service all four of our morning shows and all the remote cut-ins. Morning shows from anywhere was the hope.”
The Gateway 8 provided the option to phase out copper ISDN lines completely and rely on the Gateway 8 connected over fiber to Bridge-IT codecs.
“We also use the Report-IT Enterprise app extensively over cellular connections for both shows and remote cut-ins.”
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The Gateway 8 services two Parksville stations, CHPQ(FM) and CIBH(FM), as well as CHWF(FM) and CKWV(FM), both out of Nanaimo. It is connected 24/7 on two stations.
“We’ve never had any dropouts or audio issues,” Mandziak said. “We now do morning shows remotely from announcers’ homes and other locations that often change daily. We also connect to the Gateway for remotes and voice tracking. If anyone gets sick, they can easily do their show from home using the Report-IT app as a codec and transport.”
The upgrade has allowed the stations to get rid of all their copper ISDN links and increased their capability and flexibility. Mandziak said the savings from dropping the ISDN and broadcast loops was appreciable.
